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Rh that the young man was to follow him, and they left the mosque together. The black walked rapidly, and led Mahmoud-Ben-Ahmed, with many a twist and turn, through the tortuous tangle of the streets of Cairo. Once our young man would have entered into conversation with his guide, but the latter, opening wide his mouth that bristled with sharp, white teeth, showed that his tongue had been cut away at the roots. This circumstance would have rendered it difficult for him to commit an indiscretion.

At last they reached a portion of the city that seemed entirely deserted and to which Mahmoud-Ben-Ahmed was a stranger, although he was born in Cairo and thought that he knew every quarter of it: the mute stopped before a whitewashed wall in which there was no indication of a door. He measured off six paces, from the corner of the wall and then looked very carefully among the interstices of the stones, doubtless for a spring that was concealed there. Having discovered it he pressed the lever and a column revolved upon its axis, disclosing a dark and narrow passage which the mute entered, followed by Mahmoud-Ben-Ahmed. First they descended a flight of steps, over a hundred in number, after which they pursued their way along a dark corridor that seemed to be of interminable length. Mahmoud-Ben-Ahmed, as he groped his way along the walls, covered with sculptured hieroglyphics, knew that they had been cut through the living rock, and perceived that he was among the subterranean passages of an ancient Egyptian necropolis which some one had utilized by transforming them into this concealed exit. There was a glimpse of bluish daylight visible in the remote